🇨🇦 Canada · West and the Canadian Rockies
Banff is the tourist heart of the Canadian Rockies and one of the most spectacular places in all of Canada. It is a picturesque mountain town set inside Banff National Park —the country's first, and a UNESCO World Heritage Site— surrounded by snowy summits, coniferous forests, glaciers and lakes of an incredible turquoise color that look painted. Few landscapes in the world pack so much alpine beauty into such an accessible space.
The town of Banff, with its main street (Banff Avenue) full of shops, restaurants and mountain views, is the perfect base for exploring the park's wonders: riding the Banff Gondola to the top of Sulphur Mountain for a 360-degree panorama, soaking in its hot springs, cruising Lake Minnewanka, looking out over Bow Falls and, above all, taking the unmissable trip to nearby Lake Louise and Moraine Lake, two of the most photographed lakes on the planet. Wildlife —moose, deer, bears, mountain goats— is everywhere.
This guide covers the essentials of Banff with a practical, warm eye: how to enjoy the town and the park, get up into the mountains, visit the turquoise lakes, drive a stretch of the Icefields Parkway and use Banff as your Rockies base, in summer (hiking and lakes) as much as in winter (skiing and snow). It is a destination that leaves you breathless and a dream for anyone who loves nature and mountains.
The stretch of the Rockies where Banff stands today was the territory of Indigenous peoples for thousands of years, especially the nations of the Blackfoot Confederacy (Siksika, Kainai, Piikani), the Stoney Nakoda and the Tsuut'ina, who hunted, traveled the valleys and knew the area's hot springs, considered a sacred place. Banff's modern history began, like so many in western Canada, with the railway. In 1883, during the construction of the Canadian Pacific transcontinental railway, three workers found hot springs on the flank of Sulphur Mountain (the Cave and Basin Hot Springs). The dispute over ownership of those springs led the Canadian government to a historic decision: in 1885 it set aside the area around the springs, and in 1887 it enlarged that reserve to create Rocky Mountains Park, Canada's first national park (and one of the first in the world), the seed of today's Banff National Park. The name 'Banff' was chosen by railway executives in honor of the region of Banffshire, in Scotland. To draw tourists to its new railway, the Canadian Pacific built the grand Banff Springs hotel in 1888 (today the Fairmont Banff Springs), a 'castle in the mountains' that became the symbol of the place and drew wealthy travelers from all over the world. That is how tourism in the Rockies was born. Through the 20th century Banff grew into a world-famous destination, while the park expanded and conservation awareness developed. In 1984 the Canadian Rocky Mountain Parks (Banff, Jasper, Yoho and Kootenay, plus provincial parks) were declared a UNESCO World Heritage Site. Today Banff is one of the most visited nature destinations on the planet. The full story is on our history page.
Read the full history ↓The province of the prairies and the Rockies: Blackfoot and Cree land, land of cattle ranching and oil, home of Banff —Canada's first national park—, of Lake Louise and of the dinosaurs of Drumheller.
Read the history of Alberta →No exact prices: a scale from $ (budget) to $$$$$ (luxury), with 2-3 options per category.
Origins, formation and what the sources say.
Long before the town of Banff or the national park existed, the Rocky Mountains and their valleys were the territory of Indigenous peoples for thousands of years. The region was traveled and inhabited by nations such as those of the Blackfoot Confederacy (Siksika, Kainai, Piikani), the Stoney Nakoda (Îyârhe Nakoda), the Tsuut'ina and the Kootenay (Ktunaxa), among others. For these peoples, the mountains, valleys and rivers were part of a territory rich in game —especially bison on the nearby plains, and deer, elk and other animals in the mountains— and of routes crossing the Rockies.
One central element of Banff's future history was already known and valued by Indigenous peoples: the hot springs that come up warm from Sulphur Mountain. That steaming, sulphur-smelling water was considered a special place, with healing properties and a spiritual character. Lake Minnewanka, whose name in the Nakoda language refers to the 'water of the spirits', is another example of the sacred meaning the region held for its inhabitants.
The arrival of the railway and of European settlers in the 19th century, and the later creation of the national park, radically transformed this world and, in many cases, shut Indigenous peoples out of lands they had used for generations. Today, the history and presence of these nations are an increasingly recognized part of the story of Banff and the Rockies, and their ancestral connection to this territory is valued as a fundamental layer of its history.
Banff's modern history, like that of so many places in western Canada, began with the transcontinental railway. In the 1880s the Canadian Pacific Railway (CPR) was laying its track across the Rockies, in one of the most colossal engineering feats of the age. Crews of workers pushed their way through the mountains, and with them came a permanent European presence in these remote valleys.
The founding episode came in 1883, when three railway workers exploring the flank of Sulphur Mountain came upon a cave hiding a steaming hot spring: what is known today as Cave and Basin. Amazed, the workers saw in that hot water a possible source of wealth, and disputes soon arose over who had the right to exploit it commercially as a spa.
That dispute over ownership of the springs reached the federal government of Canada, and it had a far-reaching consequence. Rather than award the springs to private parties, the government decided to reserve them for the nation. That conflict over some hot water was, without meaning to be, the origin of Canada's first national park. The springs that Indigenous peoples already knew and that the workers 'discovered' would become the seed of one of the world's great national park systems.
The Canadian government's decision to reserve the hot springs for the nation took shape in 1885, when a reserve was established around the Cave and Basin springs. Two years later, in 1887, the government enlarged that reserve to create Rocky Mountains Park, a broad protected area around the springs and the surrounding valleys. It was Canada's first national park and one of the first in the world (after pioneering Yellowstone in the United States), the seed of today's Banff National Park.
The creation of the park answered a mix of motives. On one side there was the idea, new at the time, of preserving an exceptional natural landscape for public enjoyment and for posterity. But on the other there was a strong commercial component: the Canadian Pacific railway needed passengers and profits, and saw in the spectacular Rockies landscape and the hot springs a magnet to draw tourists. The park was thus born with a double calling of conservation and of railway-linked tourism development.
The name 'Banff' was chosen by the railway's executives in honor of the region of Banffshire, in Scotland, where some of the CPR's senior figures came from (such as George Stephen, the company's president). The town that grew up beside the train station and the springs took that name, which over time would spread to the whole park. Banff was born as a tourist destination planned around the railway, in the heart of an unequaled mountain landscape.
To turn the new park into an attractive and profitable destination, the Canadian Pacific railway bet on luxury. In 1888 it opened the Banff Springs Hotel (today the Fairmont Banff Springs), a grand Scottish baronial hotel —a true fairy-tale castle in the middle of the mountains— designed to house wealthy travelers arriving by train from eastern Canada, the United States and Europe. The motto of the CPR's strategy, attributed to its manager William Van Horne, sums up the idea: 'if we can't export the scenery, we'll import the tourists'.
The Banff Springs, with its imposing architecture, its luxury comforts and its spectacular setting, became at once a symbol and a tourist magnet. Around it, and beside the hot springs, the town of Banff grew to serve visitors: hotels, shops, bath houses. The railway also promoted other iconic developments in the region, such as the Chateau Lake Louise, on the shore of the lake of the same name. That is how mountain tourism in the Canadian Rockies was born, with Banff at its center.
Over the following decades Banff established itself as one of the great tourist destinations in Canada and in the world. Travelers came drawn by the hot springs, the mountain air, the alpine landscapes and the chance to climb (the area attracted mountaineers, and Swiss mountain guides were hired). The car, restricted in the park at first, ended up democratizing access, hugely expanding visitor numbers through the 20th century.
Through the 20th century, as Banff grew as a destination, the idea of what a national park should be was evolving too. If in its early days tourism development and resource extraction took priority (there was coal mining in the area, and Lake Minnewanka was dammed), over time a stronger awareness of conserving nature and ecosystems took hold. Park management came to balance mass tourism with the protection of wildlife, forests, glaciers and ecological corridors (wildlife crossings over and under the highway were built, for example, to reduce animal collisions).
International recognition of the exceptional value of these mountains came in 1984, when UNESCO declared the Canadian Rocky Mountain Parks a World Heritage Site, a group that includes the national parks of Banff, Jasper, Yoho and Kootenay, along with several provincial parks. The designation recognizes their exceptional mountain landscapes —peaks, glaciers, lakes, canyons, caves, hot springs— and their geological and ecological importance, including world-famous fossil beds (such as those of the Burgess Shale, in Yoho).
Banff, as the most visited core of this group, today faces the challenge of managing enormous tourism (millions of visitors a year) without degrading what people come to see. The restrictions on car access to places like Moraine Lake, the shuttle systems and the wildlife protection rules are part of that effort to reconcile public enjoyment with conservation, which is the very mission of a national park.
Today's Banff is one of the most celebrated and most visited nature destinations on the planet, the tourist heart of the Canadian Rockies and a symbol of Canada's natural beauty. Every year millions of visitors from all over the world arrive drawn by its turquoise lakes (Louise, Moraine), its mountains, its glaciers, its wildlife and its scope for adventure, in summer (hiking, lakes, wildlife) as much as in winter (world-class skiing at resorts such as Sunshine Village and Lake Louise).
The town of Banff, despite its small size and modest permanent population, is perfectly equipped for tourism, with hotels, restaurants, shops and services, while keeping its mountain-town charm. It is worth remembering that Banff is a town inside a national park, with special rules that limit its growth and protect its surroundings: land cannot be bought freely and the town cannot expand without restrictions, precisely in order to preserve the nature around it.
Banff's great challenge in the 21st century is balance: how to let so many people enjoy this paradise without destroying it. The tourism management measures (public transport, shuttles to the lakes, reservations, wildlife education) aim to reconcile the enormous demand with conservation. For the traveler, Banff still offers an unforgettable experience: the chance to immerse yourself in one of the most spectacular mountain landscapes in the world, with the comfort of a well-organized destination. More than a century after those railway workers came upon a hot spring, Banff is the emblem of the Rockies and a natural treasure that Canada shares with the world.